Some Thoughts on Sustainable Forestry

[crtreedude]

Gunny,

I think you have a point. (by the way - could you point me to your article?) Gather around the campfire my friends and let me tell you are story...

Once upon a time there were these really big machines. It took a lot to buy one and maintain them, so the average person, even business, couldn't have one, so what people had to do is share them. You got charged either for the work that was performed - or they did it all and sold it themselves.

But, eventually something happened - some rather bright people figured how to make smaller machines which would do roughly the same thing, but a lot cheaper. At first, these machines were pretty lame, but over time, they got better and better.

Now, these machines are totally replacing what are commonly called old dinosaurs. The companies who built and ran the old dinosaurs are either nearly out of business, or are now making the new smaller machines. There will always be a few of the monsters - but very specialized.

Figured out what I am talking about? Nope, not sawmills - computers.

Think history might just repeat itself?  ;)

The industrial revolution was the idea of an investment in equipment could make business more efficient - but usually it required a lot of capital.

The micro revolution is about reducing the size of the equipment, and the amount of capital required. If it holds true to form, pretty soon, a lot of middle men will be removed. After all, if I have a tree and I turned it into a board - you can buy the board from me - and you buy it for less, and I make more.

Also, I can make exactly what you want - where as in a big box store, I have to accept what they make - just like with PC computers - you can easily customize them. No, they aren't as fast as or as efficient to operate as a large mill - but they can be more flexible.

just my dos colones - oh, and if anyone wants to argue - I have a lot of emails saved from my early days in computers where people said that these PCs that have invaded the world would never amount to anything... You really don't want to go there.  :D

By the way - we aren't done on the shrinking things yet - heard of nano-technology?

[crtreedude]

Just to throw something on the other side - I was talking to someone yesterday that need to invest 5 million dollars in device to be able to use wood otherwise people would throw away. This way, he gets his wood for about free - less the expense of the equipment of course.

So, by investing in the big equipment, he is going to do very well I think. The break point is when a small mill, or small computer, can now do the work of a larger one.

The automated systems of the WoodMizer and Peterson's are creeping into the territory of the sawmills.

So, there will always be people with the big systems - either computers or sawmills or whatever you think - but there are lots of people now who can make a living off their wood lot - which is also a good thing.

The small computers have not replaced the mainframes completely - but I doubt anyone who is reading this is using a mainframe to do so...  :D

The next 20 or so years should be really interesting.

[Fla._Deadheader]

but these companies are scared not to buy FSC wood because they could be picketed

  This is exactly the point I was trying to make, yesterday. Don,t like it much, but, for export, looks like you have to play the game, sorta.  : :

[Gary_C]

It is hard to imagine that certification can survive when it is NOT market driven. Can it be achieved by blackmail?   ???

The other subject of endangered species may also be in trouble in the US because of funding. At the present time when various groups are trying to add hundreds of species per year, the congress is asking just what are we getting for the money spent to date. Turns out that many of the species were erronously listed in the first place and there very few if any species that have been "saved"  with all this money spent.  What little money that will be spent needs to be focused on the truly needy species and not just spent on getting more species listed.

[MemphisLogger]

Gunny,

What you are talking about is kinda what Jim Birkmeier (referenced by crtreedude above) was trying to help happen with the coop he was involved with.

The idea was that small landowners would cooperatively operate a kiln and value-adding operation (flooring moulder) and market the product directly themselves for a higher return that would make low-intensity harvest economically feasible in competition with high-volume harvesting.

It failed, not because the model is not feasible, but because of bad personality problems, unrealistic expectations, poor cash flow planning and perhaps, to some extent, because they operated as a non-profit with almost all of their production costs being covered by grants before the market was realized.

This is just one case of failure, however, other coops are thriving and new ones are coming together.    

The unfortunate result of capital concentration, merging and consolidation amonst the big boys of timber is that logs are being transported long distances to concentrated facilities where large volumes are bought dirt cheap with little to no competition in the market.

Truckers and loggers can't afford to eat the increased transportation costs and/or investment in high-volume equipment (they haven't got a raise in decades) and they can't pass the costs on to the big mills (they won't pay it) so it's the landowner who eats it with low stumpage.

Smaller scale value-adding markets close to the source is the solution to this--sawmills, planer mills, manufacturers, pallet shops and even mulchworks within the forest dependent community creates more competition for timber closer to home. Transportation costs are lower, local employment is greater and more diversified and local tax revenues (schools) benefit.

Some regions in some states still enjoy this sort of local, diversified, value-adding forest product economy. South central Missouri, eastern Kentucky and western Pennsylvania have all held on to some extent in this regard.

Other areas--notably parts of Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee and Louisiana-- have seen much more concentration of capital in primary processing and suffered the low stumpage and seen vast volumes of good growing stock lost to the high-volume, short rotation forestry that pays in these non-competitive markets.

Heck, I regularly get calls from all over TN and MS offering to sell Walnut stands that were planted 50 years ago when there were local diversified specialty markets. Now, they can't find the buyers. Logs form a typical harvest in my area travel as far as 200 miles before finding their markets--not much money in this unless you haul a heck of a lot of wood.

Good hardwood forestry--uneven aged 50 year+ plans--can only exist if there are strong markets for all grades and species. This is only viable when you have a healthy LOCAL market for logs.

This is where I believe FSC (or other third party certification) can benefit the forest dependent community. Certified wood is a growing market both globally and domestically. FSC has created this market and vast acreage of timber is already certified. The next step is getting all that certified wood to that market while maintaining an auditable chain of custody. This requires FSC specialized sawing, kilning, brokering, rough planing, moulding and manufacturing. This is an opportunity to establish, restablish or recruit new value-adding industries into our forest dependent communities. Once these markets are established, smaller landowners can also benefit through certified cooperative management plans and enjoy the returns of higher stumpage in a more competitive market.

I passed up a job opportunity last spring doing FSC outreach to small mills in the Appalachia. I now wish I'd taken it because I've come to firmly believe that the future of sustainable forestry AND sustainable forest dependent communities lies in taking back value-adding opportunities that have been allowed to accumulate in the pockets of a few large companies.

The fella that ended up doing this job, Harry Groot, would fit right in here . . .
http://www.nextgenwoods.com/

Again, I say, the Grange must rise!        

   
   


       

[SwampDonkey]

crtreedude, in the day of the C=64, IBM wouldn't even sell the home user a computer, at least not here. They were selling them to businesses only. There were several computer superstores around the small cities here and it was like going into an Office in the Bank of Nova Scotia. It wasn't like going into Staples. In fact you had to go through security.  :  Most every department store and hardware store carried a C= computer product back then. I only started to see Tandy PC's in Radio Shacks that started popping up in the late 80's. When I went to University most anyone with a computer had a C=64/128 in the late 80's. The university started getting IBM models, with monochrome screens. In my facaulty every professor bought Apple Macintosh, E-VER-Y 1 did. The forestry department had 100 % TRS80 computers in their classroom labs, the Engineering Department had IBM XT's.  IBM only sold in volumes, not to individuals until the PS/2 came out. :D

Did anyone else witness a similar trend?

[SwampDonkey]

I'm curious as to how profitable that Blue Ridge Cooperative is. I do realize that area takes in alot of ground. I've been throughout those hills on private woodlots and national forests and I never saw anyone cutting wood anywhere. Everyone uses heatpumps in their homes. The hills along the turnpike are so steep in places a mountain goat couldn't stand up. ;D There were some small farms on the flatter land with 4 or 5 cows, 10 -30 acres of corn, a small garden. Couldn't live off that here. :D Anyone my friend and I talk to on those lots had a University job or works in a factory such as Owens-Corning and there was a military factory near Christiansburgh I beleive. I know there was also some military ground where my friend hunted deer.  ;)

As I said above, I'm curious. ;)

[Gunny]

Fred:

That piece I referenced is actually one from the AFF's "tree farmer" magazine.  It begins on page 16 of the Sept/Oct 2000 edition.  Sorry for the misguidance to one of my other articles from the ISW during the same time-frame!  The editor renamed the thing, "A Better Way: From Raw Timber to Great Returns"--I still think my working title, "The Ten-Tree Tally", was better!  But it's a four-page piece and packed with things that just might get you thinking.  Some nice photos, too.

Also: The Nov/Dec 2001 issue has some pics of me and the kids (back then) starting on page 12, within the piece, "The True Tally."

Scott:

Forget saving the world, run behind those Huskies!  We have a pair of Alaskans and a pair of Seppala Sibes we run and we're getting some fine weather to get them on the sled.  That dryland rig gets old about this time of year and we've been blessed with some great powder, low temps and minimum humidity lately.  Nothing like a slide along behind those beauties! (Sometimes even face-down!)

Erhhhh, where were we??????

Oh--I quit thinking we could ever get this timber resource management, value-added beast organized with more than one player at a time years and years ago.  Frankly, doesn't it sometimes seem that once that second person gets added to the stew that more time is spent trying to get things accomplished in a fair and equitable manner than in actually accomplishing anything at all?

My published insights/memoirs/recollections focus upon those things that can be considered which might benefit the individual player/actor/homesteader/whatever we wish to call him/her.  I once oversaw a federal rural antipoverty operation and came to realize fairly quickly that genius rarely runs within the mob psyche.  While I was presenting owner-built housing options (log cabins, stick-built bungalows, geodesic domes) to my clientele, they were longing for the comforts of those 3-bedroom, aluminum-sided, two-car garage HUD houses that were all the rage back then (1973-74).  

That first article I mentioned to Fred pretty much says all I have--even now, some years later--to say about that particular option (and I certainly accept that so many more are out there).  It simply does not make one lick of sense to me to be offing my lumber for a buck/bf green or even $2.50 kiln-dried all the time when I can EASILY bring $10.00/BF or more for a rustic harvest table and benches or anything else I conjure with my hatchet and draw knives.  And it's a whole lot harder on my body to fell, buck, skid, saw, load and dry (and unload) lots of lumber day after day, etc., than to create a hand-hewn four poster bed from a relatively few sticks set in the rafters of the workshop for just that purpose.  

Ten good trees will easily yield 4MBF.  And that times $10.00/BF is about 3 times our homestead's annual expenses. And that doesn't even count what I do with the scraggly old limbs that I slice into tear-drop plaques that return just about $150.00 per single 100" stick!  

I know that this approach is not going to be applicable/feasible to the entire realm of rural dwellers.  But, for those who have tired of chasing carrots and/or being the whipping boy of the Mr. Bigs of this world, it sure beats heck out of watching one's treasures vanish into the void of some global market place.

Must scoot to the shop.  One of those nice little projects awaits.  

[crtreedude]

This is actually a pretty nice example - if you can sell the end product, and easily do the harvesting, drying yourself - you can make out really well.

This is because the equipment to do it has gotten cheap enough.

Just like building your own website and using computers to run a business from Costa Rica...

[MemphisLogger]

Forget saving the world, run behind those Huskies!  We have a pair of Alaskans and a pair of Seppala Sibes we run and we're getting some fine weather to get them on the sled.  That dryland rig gets old about this time of year and we've been blessed with some great powder, low temps and minimum humidity lately.  Nothing like a slide along behind those beauties! (Sometimes even face-down!)

HUH?  ???

Only Huskies we run down here in Memphis are orange  ;D

Only dog I run is a Bluetick  8)

As for adding value, I sold two clear 22" x 10' 6/4 AD clear Cherry boards last spring for $220/piece. Sold two more outta the same log a few months later after planing, scraping and joining into a table top for $1000/piece  8)

Along the same line . . . sawed 2 Cherry logs thru and thru for a customer 3 years ago--ended up costing him 30 cents or so a bdft on my hourly rate. One of the live edged flitches (about 20" wide, 9' long) just made it's way back to my shop via a broker, a kiln and a retailer. Customer paid $18/bdft for it and when he asked who he could get it finished by (countertop), they sent him to me. Boy was he depressed when I showed him a whole pile of the stuff selling for $5  ;) :D

Several of my regular customers are gentleman farmers. They pay me to saw their wood (usually blowdowns or overmatures) and then sell it to friends and neighbors off the drying stacks--makes 'em far more money than a full blown timber sale ever would and leaves their woods the way they want them.

If forests on the urban interface are going to keep producing timber, I think this is the way things are gonna have to go . . . a lot of small scale, low impact harvesting operators (cable or horse) and localized or self-value adding to get the best return on what is removed.

Gunny,

Have ya ever tried skiddin' logs with those dogs of yours?             

[Ironwood]

Fellas,

  Great discourse and I guess I am doing what you are all speaking of, small scale value added. Yes, the back aches but the satisfaction is emense. I truely enjoyed the depth of the conversation (as it were).

                                 Regards Reid

[crtreedude]

We're deep - how did that happen?

I think we are just simple...

[SwampDonkey]

Get the gum rubbers out ;D :D

[Ironwood]

 I hear it stated in the sophisticated slur of a NY Interior Designer "YOUR DISCOURSE IS SIMPLY DEEP"  We had "Tingly's" that we worn in the milk barn when I was a kid.

                     REID

[Gunny]

Mes Amis:

Scott:  Doesn't it say somewhere in your profile that you're running a "flock of Huskies"?  Aha: Husqvarnas????????????????  My all-time fave saw!

My Tingleys still fit and are always on when I think I'll be stepping into deep ^#@!.  But this conversation is exactly what keeps me coming back.

I recall trying to initiate a similar conversation here about a year ago and, essentially, gettting chuckled out of the discourse by a couple of fellows who still hadn't realized that the "Status Quo" which represents the plunder-and-pillage mentalities was on its way out as resources dwindle and private landowners begin to comprehend exactly what we're discussing here today.

If my memory serves me (which is sometimes questionable at this age!), we private woodlot owners own/control over 100 million acres of timber here in the USA alone.  Imagine if all those trees were suddenly no longer available for the pennies-on-the-stump price anymore?  Talk about "Sustainable Forestry"!

Scott & Reid:  One of my best decades-long customers (and a good pal, too) once started gawking around my workshop, amazed at the clunky things I had stacked or leaning ahgainst the walls here and there.  He spied a set of grizzled old 8/4 by 22" by 50" ant-tracked slabs of Eastern White Pine that I've been hoarding--along with about 200 more similar pieces--and gasped, "Man, put those two together and call it a table and you've got a $2000.00 piece!"  This from a Master Artisan/Craftsman who makes stuff that easily sells in the $50.00/BF range.

Not that long ago, my "treasures" would have been tossed out as "defects" by most folks and torched on the campfire.  But, to be sure, perspectives are slowly shifting and some semblance of intelligence seems to be returning to those who see the beauty of simplicity. 

Must scoot to the kiln and workshop but want to thank you all for this fascinating gab. 

Best to all.

Jim

[MemphisLogger]

I ain't deep . . .

I'm DEEP FRIED!

[crtreedude]

The cool stuff is the stuff the big sawmills don't want. This to me is the exciting part. The big guys make their money on numbers - if you are running a million BF - you don't need much per BF to have good return.

But, if you can take a "worthless" piece of wood because it isn't 1x8x8' clear and use it to create something - well, you have something pretty cool.

I think we are talking the difference between a company who quarries marble for construction - and an artist to takes a piece of marble and makes a statue.

You aren't going to make a company like the second one - but the artist might just make enough to do the work he loves and provide for his family.

[Minnesota_boy]

This is where I believe FSC (or other third party certification) can benefit the forest dependent community. Certified wood is a growing market both globally and domestically. FSC has created this market and vast acreage of timber is already certified. The next step is getting all that certified wood to that market while maintaining an auditable chain of custody. This requires FSC specialized sawing, kilning, brokering, rough planing, moulding and manufacturing. This is an opportunity to establish, restablish or recruit new value-adding industries into our forest dependent communities. Once these markets are established, smaller landowners can also benefit through certified cooperative management plans and enjoy the returns of higher stumpage in a more competitive market.
       

I like to think about how this can benefit the smaller landowners, but you can call me a cynic for thinking that all the smaller landowners will be long dead before this shows any benefit to them.  :'(

[MemphisLogger]

Well obviously, sustainability is not a short term thing  ;)

Many small landowners who have already been operating under a 50 year+ selective management plan are virtually automatic shoe-ins for FSC certification. The key is making it affordable by certifying many under the same audit to spread costs.

As for how long out premium price returns would be, if the greenies keep successfully boycotting Home Depots, Office Maxes, Victoria's Secrets, etc., there should be a demand that outstrips supply and commands higher prices in no time.

Sustainable forestry is an investment in the future and like all good longterm investments, it costs a little more on the front end for the greatest return in the longterm.

As for mom and pop that are currently counting on cashing in for fixed financial goals--tuition, retirement, etc.--conforming to a longterm select management paln that meets FSC requirements may not be realistic. But perhaps in the next rotation it's feasible(?)

I know several investors that are currently buying cutover land and view the upfront cost of FSC certification as just another part of their replanting/restoration costs knowing (believing) that by the time their timber investment achieves maturity, FSC certification will give them added market advantage.     

[SwampDonkey]

 

[beenthere]

I don't like to be 'negative' but I see this whole certification thing as an eventual 'loss of private control' of our woodlots.

Meaning, it looks harmless and good to have good management now, so let us do the 'certification' so all are 'encouraged' to do a better job of managing their woodlots (large and small). But it's like a small dustball or snowball, gathering dust (snow) and getting larger and larger. I see the future being 'committee's' that will decide what and how our woodlots will be managed.
Even now, in Wisconsin, the apparent new managed forest law (MFL) is changing (all lands under this law are now 'certified' I hear) and the new plans are requiring some sort of cutting every 15 years.  I am glad when I entered some acerage into the 'forest law' of 1968, that I didn't have to have someone cutting in my woodlot every 15 years. I would feel like I didn't own it, but someone else did.
I've enjoyed 'managing' my woodlot for the last 37 years, and have resisted the efforts of 'well meaning foresters' to cut all of the big red oak that are likely hollow. When their time comes, and I need firewood, and there are good ash and walnut seedlings coming up, I take one or two down. There are only about 6 left, and I enjoy them, and enjoy showing people what a big tree looks like. 
Used to be the 'law' was that the forest land could not be burned or grazed. That was the initial push, to save woodlots that were being kept for pasture, so burning and grazing was the norm. Next came the requirement for a management plan, and now comes the requirement for a cut every 15 years. Slowly but steadily, they are taking control of my woodlot. I don't like that much.   I see the certification game as escalating that 'control' and takeover.

[MemphisLogger]

Beenthere,

That's one of the benefits of the FSC certification approach to sustainable management--it is a voluntary affair with no enforcement beyond possible loss of certificate. Should financial need arise a landowner could always opt to bail on FSC and liquidate their timber penalized only by the loss of their investment in the FSC certificate.

Nothing in FSC requires harvesting. It sounds like your state law is aimed more at making sure that forestland stays in production.  :P 

I'd prefer to pursue voluntary over mandatory (law) any day. The same enviros promoting voluntary certification could just as easily be spending their time lobbying for forestry laws ala California.     

SwampDonkey,

I'm glad we're helping you catch up on your zzzzzzzzs.  ;D

[Paul_H]

Scott,

Good for you in pursueing FSC certification for your property/woodlot. It's good to see someone take the initiative and going for it instead of merely talking about it.Those enviros promoting voluntary certification probably don't have 10 acres between them,so it's refreshing to see this kind of commitment.

[MemphisLogger]

Paul,

Thanks for the kind words. I'm a longtime enviro myself--have even sat in a few trees here and there--but I'm also a chainsaw wielding, deer huntin', coonhound runnin' redneck  ;D

For clarification, I'm not certifying my property (not enough to be worth it) I'm certifying my sawmill and planermill operation to provide a certified chain-of-custody market for those landowners who have already certified or wiol be certifying their properties. We'll be marketing FSC certified S2S RW, S4S cabinet stock and T&G flooring and paneling to the architects/builders participating in the USGBC LEED program and other discerning consumers. Once we're online with our certification, we'll also be brokering imported FSC lumber.

Scott

[Paul_H]

What's involved in having your operation certified?How much property is needed to make it worthwhile? Is your certification basically a Bond?

Would it be fair to say that the financial burden rests solely on the property owner?